WASHINGTON - Robert Frank Miller, also known as Robert Franklin Miller, 55, of Washington, D.C., was sentenced on December 10, 2008, by U.S. District Judge Richard J. Leon to 17 years in prison stemming from his November 2007 convictions following trial in November 2007 on two counts of wire fraud and nine counts of inducing victims to travel across state lines in execution of a scheme to defraud real estate investors of over $400,000 from July 2003 through April 2004, announced U.S. Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor. Miller was also ordered to pay restitution of $495,955.49.

In handing down the sentence, Judge Leon ordered that Miller’s federal sentence run consecutively to a 2005 Maryland state sentence of 12 years of imprisonment imposed on Miller for four counts of theft. Miller will begin serving the federal sentence upon release from his Maryland state sentence. As a result, Miller could serve up to 29 years collectively on the Maryland and Federal sentences.

The government’s evidence at trial established that Miller operated and controlled American Funding and Investment Corporation (AFIC), purporting to offer high-profit real estate investment opportunities to investors and also mortgage financing to individuals with poor credit ratings. The government established at trial that Miller falsely represented to investors that he and AFIC: 1) had purchased or were in the process of purchasing groups of properties in Baltimore and Atlanta; 2) would produce guaranteed profits for investors of from 15 to 100 percent payable every 90 days; 3) owned a mortgage company and bank and could obtain mortgages for people regardless of their credit ratings; and 4) ran the largest foreclosure company in the District of Columbia, Virginia and Maryland. The government also established at trial that Miller did not place investors’ funds as he had represented, but rather used them for his own benefit, to make rent and advertising payments, to pay employees and to make lulling payments to investors to create the illusion that the investment programs were actually producing profits.

In announcing the sentence, U.S. Attorney Taylor praised the work of former U.S. Secret Service Special Agent Anthony Saler, Criminal Research Specialist Carrie Finch, and U.S. Secret Service Special Agent Chad Brewer, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Inspector General Special Agent Lori DiCriscio, U.S. Attorney’s Office Paralegals Melanie Howard and Jeanie Latimore-Brown, Legal Assistants Teesha Tobias, Lisa Robinson and former Legal Assistant Mike Thompson, Auditor Robert Jodoin and Assistant U.S. Attorneys John Griffith and Michael K. Atkinson and former Assistant U.S. Attorneys Jonathan Barr and Chad Sarchio.